Journaling and measuring results
Win rate, average R and expectancy, and why sample size matters. · about 5 min
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General education only. Not financial, tax or legal advice.
A journal turns practice into feedback. The desk logs every closed trade automatically; you add tags (for example “breakout”, “earnings”, “fomo”) and a short note on why you took it.
Key numbers
- Win rate – share of trades that made money.
- Average R – the average result in multiples of risk.
- Expectancy – what you make per trade on average. With a win rate w and an average win of WR and loss of 1R:
expectancy = w × W − (1 − w).
A 40% win rate with 3R winners: 0.4 × 3 − 0.6 = +0.6R per trade before costs. A 70% win rate with tiny winners and big losers can still lose money.
Sample size
Ten trades say almost nothing. Aim for dozens before drawing conclusions, and filter by tag to see which setups behave. Export the CSV to analyse in a spreadsheet.
Key points
- Win rate alone is misleading; look at average R.
- Expectancy combines win rate and reward:risk.
- Small samples are noise.
Checklist
Tick these off as you practise (saved in this browser).
Quick quiz
Pass mark: 2 out of 3. You can retry as often as you like.